I identified myself, told her I had just recently been speaking with Barry Duckworth, that he’d been trying to find her. She burst into tears at that point and said she had to let his son Trevor know she was okay.

Before I offered her my cell phone to call him, I had to assess whether Calder remained a threat.

“I don’t know,” Carol said. “I don’t know where he is.” She glanced back down the road and said, fearfully, “Unless he’s gone back to the cabin.”

I hailed Higgins, told him in as few words as possible that Carol Beakman had been abducted and that her kidnapper, a man named Cory Calder, might be found a short distance down the road.

He rounded up another officer and together they booted it down the road and stormed the cabin while Carol and I watched from afar. A few seconds later, lights came on, and a few seconds after that, Higgins emerged and shouted at the top of his lungs: “Weaver!”

I left Carol in the care of another officer and ran.

“Have a look and see if that’s your Calder character,” he said, pointing his thumb inside.

I took three steps into the cabin and looked at the bloody, beaten body on the floor in front of me. A poker was sticking straight up from his chest. It was hard to be one hundred percent certain, given that much of his face had been turned to pulp, but this looked like the man Jeremy and I had met on the beach.

I came back out. “I think so,” I said.

“This is turning into one clusterfuck of a night,” Higgins said.

I went back to see how Carol Beakman was doing. Another team of paramedics had arrived and were checking her out. At that point, I gave her my phone so that she could call Trevor Duckworth.

There was a lot of crying.

Not long after she’d handed the phone back to me, it rang.

Barry.

“Name a favor,” he said. “Whatever it is, it’s yours.”

Once we were done, the phone rang yet again, and I saw that it was Madeline Plimpton. I nearly answered, then decided against it. Maybe I was being paranoid. But she’d just have to worry until later.

Police Chief Bertram arrived moments later, and appeared dismayed that between the time of our conversation and his arrival, a mere shit show had turned into a disaster movie.

There were so many questions to be answered, and statements to be made, that I was worried we wouldn’t get away in time for my meeting in Promise Falls. But around five thirty in the morning, Jeremy and I were allowed to leave.

We didn’t have to pack. His backpack and my suitcase were still in the beach house, burned by now to a crisp.